


Anarchic Ankle-biters (and Their Matchmaking Capabilities)

by asleepygay



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, POV Alternating, general unprofessionalism, ronan is a kindergarten teacher
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-15
Updated: 2017-08-12
Packaged: 2018-12-02 15:23:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11512149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asleepygay/pseuds/asleepygay
Summary: Ronan Lynch hasn't had a kid in his class this annoying for most of the time he's been a kindergarten teacher. That's not even the biggest problem though - the kid's dad is gorgeous. It's distracting. Adam, on the other hand, is just trying to get his son to stop acting up in class while still having a reasonable excuse to see his super hot teacher.Gansey has heart eyes over Ronan's heart eyes, and Blue doesn't stop laughing the entire time.Based on a prompt I saw on tumblr: "My kid is the troublemaker in the class so I’m always called in for meetings with you but you’re so good looking and patient that part of me doesn’t want to actually stop them messing around because it means I get to see you more often"





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> idk you guys. Ronan is a kindergarten teacher, that's what's important. There's a lot more to this fic, I'm honestly not sure how much?? I have a fair amount written already though so let me know if you want to see more? and the ending is totally still open because i'm disorganized as fuck so feel free to let me know if you want this to go in any particular direction!

A loud crash sounds from across the room and Ronan sighs.

Playtime for the kids usually provides Ronan with some downtime - check e-mails, text Gansey profanities under his desk, that kind of thing. All he has to do is make sure the kids don’t kill each other or set the room on fire or some shit, all of which would be pretty hard to do in the super bright, almost too safe kindergarten classroom. Sometimes he engages with them, pretends to lose game after game of Memory or Go Fish or whatever, but still. Either way, playtime is a pretty chill part of the day, but this year he already has some problem kids. Well, one problem kid in particular. Six weeks into the new school year and he’s already had to have the “respectful treatment of other people’s toys” conversation with little Nathan Parrish. Like, three times.

Sure enough, when Ronan looks up he sees Nate standing next to a downed plastic kitchen set, giggling his fuckng head off. Damn, the kid is cute. It’s always the cute ones with the bubblegum laughs and the floppy curls who turn out to be the biggest pains in the ass. Ronan has really been hoping that he would be able wait until parent-teacher night to talk to the kid’s parents - he hates having to call parents in to discuss their kids’ shitty behavior. He isn’t great at feigning formality, and he really isn’t interested in it either, but parents want to know that their toddlers are safe in the hands of a kind, respectful teacher. Not that Ronan isn’t all of those things, because he takes his job very seriously in that regard, but kids don’t care about that crap. Parents are no fun. Kids just want a teacher who tosses stuffed animals at students with their hands up in lieu of calling on them, and who talks to them like they’re equals. Even at five years old, the fastest way to ensure they won’t like you is to treat them like they don’t know shit. Ronan understands that. Ronan is way better with kids than with adults.

Except Nate is apparently determined to have his parents in before the conferences, and subsequently frustrate Ronan beyond belief. The tiny jerk is surrounded by upset five year olds, and this is the fourth time he’s done something like this, and that’s not even including all the tiny disruptive shit he does during class every day. Ronan very happily adheres to the kindergarten teacher standard of “three strikes and you’re out,” which means it’s time to call in Nate’s parents. Damn.

“Come on, man, we’ve talked about this,” Ronan says when he arrives at the scene of the crime. He picks up the toppled mini kitchen and directs Nate to go stand by his desk while he calms the remaining distressed kids.

When he gets to his desk a few reassurances later, Nate is sitting on the floor, tying his own shoelaces together. Ronan decides to ignore this, hope he isn’t practicing to try that on someone else, and he kneels down next to him on the carpet.

“Hey man. You wanna tell me why you thought it would be fun to push the kitchen over?”

Nate blinks up at Ronan. “Why are you bald?”

Ronan raises an eyebrow. Okay, so he does miss some of the retort options that came with not working with children, but this is probably for the best. There are all kinds of nuances to speaking professionally that Ronan would ignore anywhere else and then probably get into trouble, whereas at least here there are very definite rules about what you can and can’t say to a five year old. So, instead of swearing or saying “because your hair looks stupid,” Ronan says, “My head isn’t bald, it’s shaved, and I like it that way. Why aren’t you bald?”

Nate giggles that cute laugh and Ronan feels his resolve crumble a little. The kid just looks so much like Ronan’s younger brother did when he was this young, only with brown hair and eyes instead of blond and blue. Still adorable. Stay strong, Lynch.

“You said you aren’t bald! My hair is longer than yours because I hate haircuts!” Ronan nods very seriously, as though haircuts are a worthy enemy, but then the kid continues, “I don’t think Mommy likes it like this. People always say I look like Daddy, and Mommy and Daddy don’t love each other anymore.”

Yikes. Ronan knows his parents aren’t together - this is the kind of shit they tell teachers who have to meet with separated parents for the conferences in two weeks - but still. Big fucking difference between knowing a kid’s parents are divorced and hearing the kid in question say “Mommy and Daddy don’t love each other anymore.” Okay, time to regroup.

“Those are some pretty interesting insights, Nate. Got any more about why you knocked over that play set while your friends were using it?”

“They aren’t my friends,” is all he says. Ronan raises an eyebrow again and waits. After a couple embarrassed seconds, Nate tries again. “It looked like it would be fun. It was fun!”

Ronan sighs. “Sure, I get that, but we’ve had this conversation, right? That’s disrespectful. To the kids, whether or not they’re your friends, to the toy, to me, to you. If you didn’t keep doing this you could be enjoying your break right now. I mean, I know I’m pretty great, but wouldn’t you rather be over there playing?”

Nate mumbles, “I guess.”

“Then you gotta stop disrespecting other students and the school’s toys, okay?”

“Okay.”

Now for the hard part. “Okay, cool. So, I hate to do this, trust me, but you remember what I said. Three strikes, right? This is your fourth, so we have to call your parents. Who should we call, Mom or Dad?”

Nate is looking at his feet. “Dad. I’m at his house on week days.”

“Awesome, Dad it is.” Before getting up, Ronan holds his hand out for a high five. “Dude, you’re cool. There’s a pretty simple solution to this problem, you just have to stop being disrespectful to your classmates and surroundings and all that. Sound like a plan?”

He nods, and hits Ronan’s outstretched hand.

“Perfect. Great. Now back to recess with you.”

 

* * *

  

Later, when he’s waiting for his afternoon class to get there, he’s sitting in the teacher’s lounge with Gansey, recounting the morning’s events and stuck in a game of phone tag with the very professional sounding voicemail of Nate’s father.

“And I look up and there the fucker is, laughing while surrounded by crying toddlers. Who raises their kid like that?”

“Who calls a five year old ‘fucker’?” Gansey counters, eyebrows raised.

Ronan just rolls his eyes and runs a hand over his shaved hair. “I’m not even at the best part, though. I go to talk to him, tell him for the fourth time this year to stop messing with school property and killing kindergarteners’ dreams, and he starts talking about how his mom doesn’t like his hair because it makes him look like his dad and, I quote, ‘Mommy and Daddy don’t love each other anymore.’”

Gansey’s eyebrows shoot higher, through no fault of Ronan’s for once. “Jesus. I am so glad I teach high schoolers.”

The school they work at is a private Catholic school that teaches kindergarten through twelfth grade, and technically the really little kids and the really old kids aren’t supposed to interact so they are kept on opposite sides of the campus, but Ronan and Gansey usually hang out in one of the staff rooms that’s relatively equidistant to both of their sides of the school.

“I don’t know,” Ronan muses, “if I had to teach high school history I’d probably gauge my fucking eyes out. You have fun grading all those papers, I’m okay way over there teaching tiny people the color red.”

He holds up a hand to stop Gansey’s response and digs his vibrating phone out of his pocket.

“Ronan Lynch.”

“Oh! Hello, Mr. Lynch, I’m glad I finally caught you. It’s Adam Parrish. Sorry about the inconvenience earlier, work has been busy. What can I do for you?”

“Mr. Parrish,” Ronan answers with a significant look at Gansey, “Hi, nice to talk to you. Unfortunately, your son Nathan has been somewhat disruptive over the course of the last few weeks. It would be great if you could come in and talk with me about how we can handle his behavior.”

Gansey shakes his head in mock disappointment and Ronan shoves him slightly.

“Nate? Really? He’s usually so calm at home. What has he been doing?”

Ronan raises his eyebrows. Calm at home. Sure. Of course he is. He continues in an even tone, “He shouts and acts out during lessons, and he misuses toys and upsets the other students during recess. He and I have now had four conversations about appropriate use of toys and being respectful of the other kids. I think it’s time you came in and we tried to work something out regarding his behavior.”

“Oh,” Adam Parrish sounds surprised. Maybe the kid really is calm at home, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a piece of shit at school. “I’m so sorry, I had no idea. Of course I can meet with you, I can come in tomorrow after school? Maybe around four?”

“Sure, four sounds great. I’ll see you then, Mr. Parrish.” When Ronan hangs up, Gansey is walking back to their seats holding two cups of coffee. He opens his mouth to say something, almost smiling, and Ronan stops him again. “I swear to God, Dick, if you’re about to say something about my growing maturity or responsibility or any other bullshit about my job with kids that makes me sound like a well-adjusted adult, I will dump those coffees on you.”

Gansey’s mouth snaps shut, but he looks pleased with himself.

“Shut up.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You look too happy about it.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Yeah, sure you didn’t,” Ronan drinks his coffee and looks away from his insufferable pseudo-brother. Said pseudo-brother just laughs and then stands up.

“I have to go, I’ve got a class soon. Yours will probably start coming in eventually too, so you should get going. I’ll see you tonight, and hey, tell me about Mr. Problem Child after your meeting tomorrow.”

“Yeah, yeah.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam Parrish goes to his son's school to meet with his teacher. It's productive and positive and he can be professional about this, really. No, really. At least, he thinks he can?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> these notes are about to be long as hell, sorry about it! so I realized that I posted a pynch fic without Ronan and Adam actually meeting in person, what an asshole. to remedy that, I'm giving y'all the next chapter like basically right away. And you'll notice that the tags have expanded! I wasn't sure if I was going to continue this, but the response has been so great that I'm definitely going to keep it up, so I've updated the tags to the full extent of the fic thus far, though they will get more updates later on. 
> 
> and speaking of the response! holy shit you guys!! thank you so much, everyone's kudos and comments mean so much to me, this is crazy. I wish I could give you the whole thing right now, but unfortunately I don't actually have as much written as I thought I did. There are only two chapters completed after this one, and it takes me about a million years to write and edit so daily updates are not actually going to be a thing for the foreseeable future, much as i wish they could be.
> 
> I'm also going to be answering questions from the comments in notes so that if anyone has similar questions they don't have to dig through the comments from every chapter. To start that off, an anon last chapter asked if Opal would make an appearance in this fic, and unfortunately I have no plans to do that right now, it just doesn't fit easily in the direction I want to bring this.
> 
> and FINALLY and brief disclaimer! LydiaStJames commented how realistic this fic has been so far from the perspective of a teacher(thank you so much!) but I would like to say that I am NOT a teacher or a parent, it's been like 15 years since I was in kindergarten, and I technically dropped out of high school so I'm basically the least qualified person on ao3 to be writing any kind of school au. My sincere apologies for all of the inaccuracies that I'm sure are to come.
> 
> christ, hopefully the notes won't be this long for every chapter. once again, thank you all so much for the hugely positive reactions to this, I wish I could update daily but I won't, and in the meantime I hope you like this chapter and please keep the responses coming!! xx

Adam feels terrible. He’s almost half an hour late to the meeting with his son’s teacher because his meeting at work had run late, and then traffic through D.C. had been characteristically nightmarish. He had at least wanted to make a good impression where his son hadn’t. No doubt the man hates this family now, what with its unruly child and tardy father. Ugh, he probably thinks Adam is a bad father. Adam winces at the thought - very little is as important to him as being good to his son. Nate always seems so calm and happy, Adam can’t even imagine what he’s doing to cause so much trouble at school. The two concepts almost don’t match up in his head - Nate and trouble? They’re just incompatible. Either way, he intends to correct both his and his son’s mistakes this afternoon, and he sends a quick prayer to any deity who is listening that he won’t make a fool of himself. Adam isn’t exactly religious, the denomination of his son’s school is only coincidental to its quality of education, but he figures he could use the extra support.

He walks into his son’s classroom and promptly loses all coherence. Okay, so not all coherence, but he walks in and gets halfway across the room and partway through the sentence, “Hello, I’m Adam Parrish, I’m so sorry I’m late-” before he feels his mind stuttering to a halt, his hand half outstretched to shake with the gorgeous young man who is seated at the teacher’s desk.

Once, Nate had told him that his teacher was bald and Adam had assumed that he was an older man. Ronan Lynch is not an older man. Ronan Lynch can’t be any older than Adam is himself. His head is not bald but shaved, close and dangerous, and a fucking tattoo is curling up the back of his neck from the collar of the button up shirt that seems to be having troubles holding in this man’s shoulders, and he has a shadow of stubble on his sharp jaw and Adam needs to stop looking at all of this because he is going to hyperventilate. Okay, millisecond of blatant unprofessionalism over, this is no problem, it just isn’t what Adam was expecting, that’s all. Everything is fine. He barely falters in his stride and continues to stretch out his hand towards Mr. Lynch’s. He looks into his eyes and almost freezes again. God damnit. Adam doesn’t know if he can even maintain the common courtesy of eye contact with this guy because his eyes are beautiful, a piercing blue, and right now they are crinkling at the corners in time with his polite smile. Adam doesn’t allow himself even a millisecond this time, just mentally repeats not what I was expecting, not what I was expecting again and again and then once more, just for good measure, and then returns the polite smile and takes Ronan Lynch’s warm hand and shakes it firmly. Ronan Lynch has a good shake. Not what I was expecting.

“Ah, a meeting ran much longer than I was anticipating, I hope you’ll forgive me,” he says, attempting to regain some control over the situation. Presumably, the control never left for Ronan Lynch. Adam reminds himself that this is a conference with his son’s kindergarten teacher about his disruptive behavior. He sets himself to the task at hand, taking on the expression of a concerned parent, which is exactly what he is. A concerned parent who isn’t going to give this man his number because that would be entirely inappropriate for the situation, and this man already has his number because he is his son’s teacher. Right.

“Sure, Mr. Parrish, no problem.” His voice is a little gruff but he speaks so relaxed, and then he waves his hand dismissively, as though it actually isn’t a problem.

Adam blurts out, “You can just call me Adam.” Mr. Parrish just sounds too formal for the situation, given that his son is in trouble here. He sort of feels like he might also be in trouble, though this man can’t possibly know what Adam has been thinking of him since he walked in.

Nate’s teacher smiles again. “Sure. So, Adam, I hate calling students’ parents in, I really do. Unfortunately, Nathan has been disregarding rules and expectations basically since day one, and I’m one of those ‘three strikes’ kind of teachers, and he’s already worked through all of his. He just doesn’t respect his surroundings here.”

This all sort of catches Adam off guard. His son is almost weirdly respectful everywhere else. Caitlin says almost the same thing every week when Adam picks Nate up after his weekend with her. He always has fun and behaves, even if she has to leave him with a sitter for a couple of hours while she rehearses. Even here, if Adam has to work late and Nate has to stay with Blue or some other sitter, he’s fine, and he never makes a fuss about the split family situation he was born into. Not that he would really know anything different, but he doesn’t even complain about the hour and a half he spends in the car twice a week, being shuttled back and forth between D.C. and Baltimore. Now that Adam thinks about it, he thinks maybe he should have expected Nate to act up in school. He sighs heavily, and Mr. Lynch looks a little surprised.

“Sorry. Nate hasn’t really been to school before this, I think he’s not used to having rules and expectations at all. He… puts up with a lot. Between his mom and I.” Mr. Lynch’s face visibly changes when Adam says this, settles into a mask like he’s preparing himself for whatever Adam says next, preparing himself to respond neutrally no matter what. Adam has no interest in making excuses, and he doesn’t want to give the wrong idea about Nate’s home life, so he rushes to continue, “It’s just that his mom lives in Baltimore so he has a long drive to see her every weekend and he doesn’t see her a whole lot to begin with. She travels a lot, it’s sort of complicated, but Nate has always been great about it. That’s just why I was surprised to hear he hasn’t been good at school. But I think he thinks it’s an unsupervised place to vent any frustration, or maybe he doesn’t realize he’s doing much wrong. It’s, uh, it’s possible I cut him too much slack at home.”

Mr. Lynch smirks a little at the end bit. “Well, sure, how couldn’t you. The kid’s adorable.”

Adam laughs a little, can’t help but beam. His son is very damn cute, thank you very much. “He definitely thinks so. Probably too many people tell him that. I really cut him too much slack at home.”

The teacher shrugs. “It happens. We just need to talk about how to get him to reign it in a little at school. Take that home attitude to school and his school attitude out to the playground or something. Maybe he’ll be a star athlete someday, but today he has got to stop throwing toys around the classroom.”

Nodding, Adam replies, “Of course. I can talk to him about it at home for sure. And I’ll definitely try to find him a more… creative outlet for any aggression.”

“Sounds good, man. He really is great to have in the class, I mean it. He’s really engaged on the days when he isn’t disruptive as hell. He’s got his ABC’s down pat.”

Adam laughs. “Well, he’s a pretty active reader.”

“Well, hey, maybe he can bring books to school or whatever. Something productive like that.” Then Mr. Lynch pushes off the wall he was leaning against and stretches his hand out again. “It was great of you to come in, and good talking to you. I’ll see you again in a couple weeks for the parent-teacher conferences.”

Adam nods, shakes Mr. Lynch’s hand. He adds, “And hopefully not for a while after that,” but he doesn’t mean it. Damnit.

Mr. Lynch smiles a lopsided grin. “Yeah, you’re telling me.”

“Nice meeting you. Have a good evening, Mr. Lynch.” And then Adam leaves, chastising himself for trying to find a reason to stay.

 

* * *

 

Nate runs ahead of him, pushing past the door into Adam’s lofty apartment and scampering into the living room to play or watch TV.

“Nate! Nate, c’mon, wait buddy. I have to talk to you first. You remember where I was today, right? I was talking to your teacher. Come here, let’s talk about this for a second.” Adam reaches over to his son and helps him onto a chair at the granite island in the kitchen. Nate looks almost abashed, an expression Adam doesn’t see on him a lot. Damn, the kid really does need to learn some humility. Adam doesn’t even know why he thinks that, though, because he knows that there’s still no way he’s going to treat him any differently. Nate will always have him wrapped around his tiny little finger.

“Hey kiddo. So your teacher, Mr. Lynch, told me that you are loud during his lessons and you throw toys during playtime. Does that sound right to you?”

He shrugs one tiny shoulder and nods, looking at his feet.

Adam sighs. “Okay, it’s okay. But class is like the train. Remember our rules when we take the train to bring you to Mommy’s? You don’t yell on the train, and you can’t jump on your seat or bother the other passengers. School is like the train, okay? We can go to the park sometimes if you want, and you can yell and run there, but not in school. Sound good?

Nate nods. “School is like the train.”

“You got it, bud. Wanna go play now?” Nate nods and jumps down and runs off. Adam ruffles his hair as he passes and goes to his room to change into sweatpants. When he comes out Nate is watching a cartoon about pirates and Adam flops down on the couch next to him. “Who’s that?”

Nate starts babbling about the characters on the screen, which ones he likes and which ones he doesn’t, what they’re doing right this second, what his favorite episode is. Adam nods and just lets him go, knowing from experience that Nate doesn’t actually need an active audience for this. He pulls his phone from his pocket and opens messages, sliding his fingers across the screen to compose a pretty pathetic text message.

To: Blue [5:16 PM]  
Hey I’m home with Nate. The meeting went fine, I talked to Nate about being disruptive. I need to call you later

Ouch. He has no idea who else to go to with this, but he has to go to someone because he sure as hell isn’t going to sit on this information alone. He really is a sad, sad creature. A few minutes later, Blue texts back.

From: Blue [5:20 PM]  
???

From: Blue [5:20 PM]  
Okay mr cryptic. Everything okay?

No. Well, yes. Well, Adam supposes it depends on the active definition of the word “okay.”

To: Blue [5:22 PM]  
It’s fine. Just wanna talk about something, that’s all

From: Blue [5:23 PM]  
Something you can’t text?

Ugh. How to answer that one. Sure, he can text it, but something in him just really doesn’t feel right about sitting right next to his five-year-old son and texting about how he wants to fuck said five-year-old son’s kindergarten teacher. Jesus. Just thinking about it feels wrong.

To: Blue [5:30 PM]  
No I can, it’s just complicated. Sort of

Yeah, right. It’s not complicated at all. Except for the teacher bit. The his son’s teacher bit. That is complicated. It shouldn’t be, because Adam shouldn’t be thinking about it like this at all, he should just focus on his son improving in school and moving on with their lives. He should not, under any circumstances, be wondering how he can see Ronan Lynch again. He should not, under any circumstances at all be wondering what Ronan Lynch looks look out of his classroom. Or out of his clothes. Adam clenches his teeth around a very loud sigh, trying not to be as frustrated about the situation as he is. He turns his attention back to the TV screen, where the show has switched to something about rescue dogs, and asks a question about a dog wearing a police outfit.

Nate fires up and starts rambling again and Adam tries his very best to pay attention this time, he really does.

After that episode Adam turns off the TV and spends a couple minutes playing with Nate on the floor before he gets up to throw together something resembling dinner. Then it’s dinner, another few games on the rug, and he sends Nate to bed, making sure he brushes his teeth before tucking him in and going back into his own room to flop down on the bed and pull his phone out. He has four missed text messages from Blue, each one more irritated by his absence than the last. He calls her and leans back, eyes closed. After a few rings, she answers.

“Oh, hey there, have you finally decided to get back to me? That’s new.”

Adam laughs, eyes opening. “Sorry, I was parenting. You know, playing with my son, feeding him, making sure he is alive and happy. That kind of thing.”

On the other end of the line, Blue sighs in mock exasperation. “Shame on you. You should know that I am clearly the most important person in your life. Who even is this Nate kid anyway?” She’s joking - very few people love Nate as much as Blue does. She drops the tone and continues more seriously, “So, what’s so complicated, anyway? What happened that you couldn’t text?”

Adam starts fidgeting with the seam of his comforter. “Nothing, it’s nothing. Do you remember that one time, a couple weeks ago, when you asked Nate how he liked school and he started talking about his teacher and we assumed the guy was, like, sixty or something?”

“Yeah,” Blue says, confusion still in her voice, though now she sounds vaguely amused, “But he liked him. Was he nice?”

“Yeah. Well, he’s not. I mean, he is nice. He isn’t sixty.” Adam bites his lip, wondering how to word it next. Apparently, he doesn’t need to worry about it after all, because after the slight pause Blue bursts out laughing.

“Adam Parrish, you bastard! You want to bang your kid’s kindergarten teacher!”

“Blue!” Adam wants to start defending himself, but he wouldn’t be able to even if he could get words in around her laughs. Just like always, Blue knew exactly what he was thinking. As much as she claims she doesn’t possess her family’s weirdly accurate intuition, she still knows Adam better than almost anyone else. This is not one of the times when Adam appreciates this.

“No, no, tell me you don’t want to fuck his kindergarten teacher.” She is still trying to smother chuckles, and Adam is considering trying to smother himself.

“I don’t want to fuck his kindergarten teacher!” Good lord. He hasn’t sounded so defensive in his life. It sets Blue off on a whole new train of laughter.

“Uh huh. Now tell me again, but this time try to do it without lying.”

Adam doesn’t respond and she cackles.

“So what was he like then, loverboy?”

“You’re having way too much fun with this. He was… nice. He seemed to be genuinely interested in Nate’s education.”

Blue sighs, exasperated. “Adam. You do not want to bang this guy because he’s nice. And not because he wants Nate to do well in school, either. At least I hope not, because that’s super weird.”

“I don’t know! He can’t be much older than we are, if he’s older at all.” Adam chews his lip, and then adds, almost as an afterthought, “He has a tattoo.”

She gasps sharply, far more dramatic than the situation calls for, and Adam knows she’s doing it on purpose. “A tattoo! Well, that’s not very kindergarten. What was it?”

“I don’t know, I just saw black linework coming out from the collar of his shirt. It went, like, halfway up his neck. And his shirt, by the way, was unbuttoned at the neck and his tie was hanging loose around it, how unprofessional is that? He works at a Catholic school, doesn’t he care about the uniform requirements?”

“Well you sure sound like you don’t care one bit.”

“Shut up, Blue. He was pretty tall, too, and he looked ripped. Seriously, it was ridiculous, you should have seen his shoulder-to-waist ratio. He’s built like Chris Evans.”

“No he’s not,” Blue scoffs.

“Okay, maybe not exactly, but way too close for comfort.”

“Or maybe close enough for too much comfort, am I right?” She laughs over Adam’s annoyed groan. “So, when are you seeing him again?”

“Blue! You aren’t supposed to be encouraging this!” Adam berates her.

“Adam. My dear, dear friend. When was the last time you got laid?”

Adam doesn’t answer.

“That’s what I thought. So, once again, when are you seeing him?”

Adam thinks about it for a second, running over the upcoming weeks in his head and - crap. “Crap.”

“What?”

“The next time I see him,” Adam replies, “will be at the parent-teacher conference in two weeks. Caitlin will be there.”

Blue makes a sympathetic noise. There’s a weird sound coming over the line, like cloth rubbing against the phone’s speakers, and Adam figures she has sandwiched her phone between her ear and shoulder to get something. Sure enough, he hears things clattering together like she’s rummaging through her refrigerator. That either means she’s getting ice cream or yogurt and settling in for the long haul, or she’s about to hang up. She says, “Ouch. Have fun with that.”

Adam snorts. “Thanks. I’m glad you’re always so supportive of me in my times of need.”

She hums distantly and he knows he’s lost her. “Yes, you’re right, you’ve found a really hot guy who seems really nice and is interested in one of the most important parts of your life. You’re really suffering right now.”

“I think you’re forgetting that his interest in the most important part of my life is purely professional, because he’s his teacher. That makes him more than a little unattainable. But whatever, go, I can tell you’re not paying attention to me anymore.” He doesn’t really mind, he should go to sleep anyway, but he’s not sure what to do with this support. Considering this situation to be an actual possibility feels like an objectively bad idea, especially because the next time he sees Ronan Lynch he will be seated next to his ex-girlfriend, the mother of his child. That can’t be anything but awkward.

Blue sarcastically makes a large, smacking kiss noise into the phone and then they say goodnight and hang up. Adam plugs in his phone and gets ready for bed, turning on the TV to distract himself for the next couple of hours before he falls asleep.

Every goddamn thing on the screen reminds him of the kindergarten teacher. Well, it’s probably not that everything directly reminds Adam of him, it’s just that he can’t get him off his mind. Adam makes everything remind himself of the guy. That has got to be worse.

He was wrong earlier today at the meeting. He is in so much goddamn trouble.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ronan Lynch is suffering all over the place, and Gansey is far too happy about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys! chapter 5 is taking me actual years to write, but that's not y'all's fault so I'm gonna go ahead and give you this and hope it motivates me some more. 
> 
> real quick, some of you guys wanted to see more of Nate so I'm v sorry to disappoint but we see even less of him in this chapter. next chapter is Adam's pov again though so don't worry, he will be back!
> 
> thanks a bunch to all of you for your comments and kudos, and to those who have been giving me teacher advice! Definitely inspired some future interactions with kids in the classroom/my general lack of regard for how schools actually work, so get hype for that. Please, keep the awesome responses coming! y'all are the best x

Ronan is being very deliberately nonchalant. He’s slouching in his chair, staring into his coffee, occasionally snapping rude jokes. It’s like a recording, like someone pretending to be Ronan Lynch. Gansey isn’t buying it for a second, but Ronan tries anyway.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong, or are you just going to keep moping? Or whatever the hell it is that you’re doing.”

“I’m not moping,” Ronan responds immediately, scowling.

“Sure you aren’t.” He shakes his head, and Ronan rolls his eyes.

“Fine. Look, I’m engaging. What do you want to talk about, Dick? Should we braid each other’s hair and talk about boys?” Ronan scoots his chair closer to Gansey’s and puts his head in his hand, sarcastically batting his eyes.

Gansey shoves him away. “Fine, fine, I get it, this is what I get for caring about you. Hey, how was that thing last night? With Mr. Problem Child? You never really told me about it.”

He hadn’t. After his meeting with Adam Parrish, Ronan and Gansey ate dinner together, as they tend to do, an old habit from many years of living together. Though they hadn’t been roommates in a couple of years, they lived together through most of high school and for a few years after college, and having dinner together a few times a week is still a common occurrence. They met for Chinese food after school, and Ronan was very careful to keep his comments about the meeting to a minimum.

“I told you, it was fine.” He shrugs, stuffs a piece of a bagel into his mouth and looks away.

Gansey raises his eyebrows. “You did. Was it that bad?”

That still wouldn’t make much sense - Ronan is not normally one to keep his opinions to himself, especially regarding bad meetings with shitty parents. He mentally curses his past self for all the times he bitched about bad parents, which are ultimately causing Gansey’s suspicion. Because that’s whose fault it is. Past Ronan. Not present-Ronan, who has been distracted ever since a tall, lean man in a suit came into his classroom and then laughed like that. Nope. Not present-Ronan’s fault at all.

“No, it wasn’t bad, I guess, it was just - I don’t know, man. It was a meeting with a parent. Whatever.”

Noah Czerny, an art teacher for the middle school grades who wears snapbacks backwards in his classroom and tries to assign as many projects involving the use of glitter as possible, seems to materialize in front of them. He pulls a chair up and sits, leans forward, and grins. “Was he hot?”

Now, Ronan Lynch doesn’t lie. It’s useless to him, empty trickery that he doesn’t have time for. It isn’t that he wishes he did lie, he just… wishes Noah hadn’t asked that. He doesn’t respond.

“Ronan Lynch,” Gansey says, turning wide eyes on the man in question. Ronan looks at him coolly, but Gansey meets his stare. “Don’t look at me like that. You’re attracted to a student’s dad. One of your students’ dads. You really are moping!”

“I am not moping! I just haven’t been mentioning it, that’s all. Because it’s not allowed, right?”

Noah looks between the two of them and then, before Gansey can respond, says, “So he was hot, right?”

“Dude, so hot.”

“Ronan.” Gansey sounds so scandalized, Ronan can’t help but laugh.

“What?” He asks. “Richard Gansey, would you have me lie?” Ronan tries to take Gansey’s same scandalized tone.

“So, like,” Noah starts in a speculating tone, “what kind of hot? Was he older, was it like silver fox hot? Trophy husband kind of guy? DILF?”

“This is so wrong,” Gansey mutters, but Ronan waves him off.

“No, no, he was our age, had to be. Kind of young to have a five year old, actually, some lean guy in a fucking nice suit.”

Noah is nodding appreciatively.

In one last ditch effort to dissuade Ronan from this track, Gansey says, “I can’t believe you are actually gossiping about this right now. You’re worse than my students.”

For the second time, Ronan turns a cool stare on Gansey. “Come on, man, what? I can’t bang him, now I can’t even talk about him? What’s even the point of being a teacher then.”

Gansey ducks his head. “Jesus. Don’t let anyone hear you talking about being a kindergarten teacher to attract men.”

Ronan whistles. “Shit Gansey, I didn’t say anything of the sort. You should watch your mouth, wouldn’t want anyone to overhear something like that.”

Gansey sighs and pushes himself up off his chair. “I’m going to go my classroom. I refuse to be a part of this conversation any longer. See you guys later.”

The thing is, Ronan knows messing around with a kid’s dad is a bad idea. There aren’t exactly rules about it, but it’s not, like, a good thing. It’s just that it’s not really about that. It’s definitely a little about that, he’s not about to pretend that Adam Parrish wasn’t fucking gorgeous, but he was also more. Ronan has always had a thing about casual flings - they just aren’t something he gets. It isn’t like he wants to walk down the aisle to every attractive guy he sees, but he has no interest in casual sex. Adam Parrish was way more than a potential fling. He was also deeply invested in the wellbeing of his child, something that Ronan could tell just by how he spoke about him and their weird situation. By mentioning how much Nate had on his plate and how good he was about all of it, Ronan could tell Adam Parrish actively respected his child. Too many people treat their kids like property, but Adam treated his like a gift. And he was charming and endearing, and his fucking laugh made Ronan a little weak at the knees. And none of that is shit that Ronan thinks about lightly - if he were to start saying crap like that, people like Gansey and Noah would start saying words like smitten. Ronan hates words like smitten. He’s actually a little angry that Adam Parrish left such an embarrassing impression on him right away. He’s fucking weak, though, so he keeps talking about him with Noah.

Gansey has to have known all of this - he has known Ronan for long enough to guess that Ronan is focused on more than just Adam’s looks. More than likely he left to give Ronan space to pretend that that's all it is, just an aesthetic attraction. Likelier still, he's going to question Ronan about it later. Ronan almost sighs. Fucking great.

Eventually his kids are going to start showing up, so he leaves Noah in the staff room making a tower out of empty coffee cups and makes his way down to the semi-secluded hallways making up the lair of the little kids. Ronan sits at his desk and finally lets out the sigh he'd been holding in, then pulls out a lesson plan and tries to make his mind focus on work.

By the end of the day, Ronan wants to hit something. When Nate comes in with the stream of students, Ronan can't help but notice all the similarities between him and Adam. Same brown hair, though Adam’s is less curly and cut shorter, more professional. Ronan can't help but wonder if Adam’s looked like Nate’s does when he was Nate’s age. Nate has brown eyes where Adam has a rich, deep blue, so Nate's eyes must come from his mom. Ronan doesn't want to think about her. Thinking about the mysterious ex-Mrs. Parrish reminds Ronan that Adam is probably straight, which is a depressing train of thought that Ronan avoids. Instead, he thinks about the fact that, just like he and Adam talked about, Nate walks into class holding a book. Not only does this further prove what Ronan has been thinking about Adam being a wonderfully involved and considerate parent, actually heeding his son’s teacher’s comments, but it's a fucking Harry Potter book. This five year old has a second or third grade reading level, at least, which makes sense - Adam is probably a genius. He's so distracted that at playtime he actually does lose a game of Go Fish. To a five year old. Fuck, he needs help.

He recognizes this, so he goes straight to Gansey’s apartment after school ends. Gansey tends to stay significantly later than Ronan does, meeting with students or grading essays or engaging in countless other bullshit tasks that Ronan is grateful his job doesn’t include. Ronan heads over when he’s done in his classroom anyway, only stopping at his own apartment to drop off his stuff and get his pet raven, Chainsaw, who gets lonely when Ronan is at work. He makes himself comfortable around Gansey’s infinite number of books and his casually expensive furniture and knick-knacks, sends Gansey a text telling him to bring pizza on his way home, and starts up Gansey’s XBox. When he finally hears the door opening a couple hours later, he has long since grown bored of whatever close combat fighting game he had shoved in the console earlier, and is now watching YouTube videos of baby animals on Gansey’s flatscreen. Chainsaw has overturned every wastebasket easily visible in the apartment, and is alternating between tearing out a string from a sock Ronan tossed her and eyeing the kitten onscreen suspiciously.

Gansey sighs when he walks into the living room, pizza boxes stacked in his arms.

“Must you bring her here?” It’s only a question out of common courtesy - Gansey is rarely impolite, but Ronan’s bird-father habits, especially when they coincide with Gansey’s living space, frequently trigger his less charming side.

Ronan shrugs, grinning at Gansey. “She gets lonely, Gansey. Ravens are very intelligent, social creatures, you know. She misses my presence.”

Gansey huffs, shoving the pizza on Ronan without even bothering to question the reel of baby animal videos playing on his TV. He’s incredibly used to it by now. “She’s the only intelligent, social creature who misses you, Ronan.”

“Ouch, man. Words hurt.” He says without emotion, snagging a slice from a box of pizza topped with sausages and pineapple. Gansey shakes his head, as though his disaster of avocado and whatever he has decided to pair it with this week is any better.

“Not that your visits aren’t lovely, Ronan,” he begins, and Ronan snorts because he knows that Gansey is being extra polite just to be annoying but he also knows that Gansey actually talks like that. Gansey’s lips quirk at his desired reaction and he continues, “but I assume that you haven’t just come to let your bird destroy my apartment.”

“How do you know?” Ronan counters. “That could very well be the only reason that I’m here.”

His statement is punctuated nicely by something in an adjacent room crashing. Gansey looks pained for a moment, and Ronan takes the time to look smug before caving to Gansey’s question.

“What, you’re gonna interrogate me, right? No sense trying to run from it.”

“So,” Gansey says, a slow smile forming, “what you’re telling me is that you came to my apartment after work to talk about boys.”

“Fuck you.”

Gansey just waits, holding his hands up in surrender. Eventually, Ronan sighs.

“I’m fucked, man.”

“I take it you haven’t given up on your previous disinterest in casual relationships, then. Unless you meant that literally.”

“No, shut up.” Ronan looks away, tries to gather some semblance of control over the conversation. It doesn’t really work, but he gives it his best effort. “I just… yeah. I haven’t. Given up on my previous disinterest, or whatever.”

“So I guess there’s a lot you didn’t say about him earlier, with Noah.”

Ronan arches one sharp eyebrow, saying no shit or maybe what do you think? Gansey isn’t phased, just rolls his eyes.

“Are you going to tell me, or should we just sit here in companionable silence? Really, Ronan, you came here. This is hardly pulling teeth.”

“I know, it’s just,” he looks like maybe it is pulling teeth. “I’m, like, really fucked.”

“So you’ve mentioned.”

“He’s just… don’t fucking judge me. I refuse to speak until I have your word that you’re not going to be a piece of shit about this.”

Gansey rolls his eyes. “Good lord, Ronan, what am I going to do?”

Ronan grumbles, “The fuck do I know? Just, like, set your Dad reactions to low, okay? If you freak out about this I will fucking hit you.”

He won’t, but Gansey nods anyway, far too seriously for the situation. Ronan rolls his eyes, but he knows he feels better about the situation having made his embarrassing demand, and he suspects Gansey knows it, too. With that out of the way, this can’t get any more fucking awkward, really.

“It’s like, he’s just. Ugh. He’s so nice, y’know? He was so genuinely interested in his kid’s behavior at school. I guess most parents are, but you know how some of them can be. Either their kid is an angel no matter what I say, or they’re my problem so it doesn’t matter. Me calling them in is a slight inconvenience in their very busy schedules or some shit like that. You know what Adam does? That’s his name. Adam Parrish. He’s a fuckin’ lawyer. It was in his voicemail, this big, long law firm name. He must have left work early to come meet with me, and when he got there he was funny and nice and he really cared about what I had to say about his son. And, yeah, he was fucking hot. And then, today, his kid walks in with this big ass book to distract him from starting shit in class again, and it turns out that his reading level is way above what it should be. Adam must have taught him to read years ago. By himself. Every fucking thing he does just makes him seem like a stupidly good person. What the fuck is that about? Also, he’s probably straight, so there’s that. Hey, get that fucking smile off your face, Gansey.”

Gansey doesn’t make an attempt to do any such thing. “It’s been a while since someone had this kind of affect on you. That’s interesting.”

“No it fucking isn’t interesting, stop being weird, this is why I never tell you this shit.” Ronan turns away, but Gansey ignores him - it isn’t true, Ronan tells him everything. He fucking wishes he didn’t, though. It would keep the stupid, knowing smile off of Gansey’s stupid, knowing face, but he wouldn’t really have anyone to tell if it wasn’t for Gansey. Still, that doesn’t make it any easier to get out what he mumbles next.

“What was that?”

Ronan sighs and looks him right in the eyes. “No one has ever had this kind of affect on me. I don’t fucking know, Gansey. Like, I’m not saying I’m in love or anything, but no one has ever… I’ve never felt so strongly for anyone so quickly. Whatever. Seriously, stop looking at me like that. I swear, you said you wouldn’t do this.”

Gansey shakes his head, trying to reign in his smile. “Alright, so when are you seeing him again?”

“I don’t know?” Ronan is taken off guard by how quickly Gansey switches to being on board with Ronan getting with one of his student’s dad.

“Well, are you going to see him again?”

“I guess I have to sometimes, his kid is still my student. And probably still a piece of shit. I can’t imagine him going the whole rest of the year without excessive incidents. Adam will probably have to come back in to talk about it. And, y’know.” There is still something very unpleasant coming up that Ronan hasn’t forgotten in the light of his new situation with Adam Parrish. He hasn’t been about to stop remembering, really. “There’s the parent-teacher conference coming up. Which he said he’s going to. With his ex-wife. The mother of his son.”

Gansey whistles softly, clapping his hand on Ronan’s back in a gesture of brotherly support. Wordlessly, he hands Ronan another slice of pizza, grabs one for himself, and reopens the video game Ronan had been playing earlier. He distributes controllers and starts a new game. They spend the rest of the night eating pizza and playing video games, silently mourning Ronan’s sanity before he even loses it. He will though, they’re both sure.

 

* * *

 

The next few weeks go more or less the same. It’s not like every day is a goddamn tragedy or anything. Ronan isn’t a schoolkid with a crush, he is a grown man with a pet raven who depends on him, fuck you very much. So he goes to work, pretends he didn’t actually just think that the only reason he isn’t sitting at home moping is because of Chainsaw, and he lives his life. He hangs out with Gansey after school, visits his brother, helps Noah think up elaborate pranks that they’ll never do for fear of losing their jobs, helps to shape the future of America, all that good stuff.

Some days are worse than others, like the Tuesday after his weird heart to heart with Gansey when he looks outside and sees Adam dropping Nate off. Normally, Nate comes early and spends his mornings in the before-care program at the school. Occasionally he comes in with the flow of kids from the buses, but it’s a rare thing. On this particular day, Adam parks a dark, shiny, professional but still family-friendly looking sedan in the front parking lot, easily visible from Ronan’s classroom, and walks Nate into the building, holding his hand. For a couple of minutes, Ronan is stressed that Adam is going to walk him all the way to the classroom and Ronan will have to actually interact with him, but it’s a good month and a half into the school year and it seems that Nate has figured out his way by now, and so he shows up alone. Ronan has to convince himself not to watch Adam drive away, but then he spends the rest of the day wondering why Adam drove him, and then he’s pissed that he’s so curious. Of course, now that he knows that this happens, he tends to watch out for it, spending far too much of his morning glancing out the window.

On one such morning, maybe a week later, he discovers a new cause of what could be classified as worse days when some woman brings Nate to school. He doesn’t know who she is, it doesn’t seem like she’s Adam’s ex, considering she apparently lives in Baltimore, but she could be. What the hell does Ronan know? This woman is pretty, really short with tanned skin and short, sort of choppy dark hair that is pulled half-back, and a radiant smile that she is constantly giving Nate. Nate is always returning that smile, dimples coming out full-force to match the one that the woman has on one of her round cheeks. She could be Adam’s current girlfriend. Or wife. Ronan hates her.

The days tick by towards the two days of the conferences. Ronan definitely doesn’t count down in his head. The thing is, Ronan isn’t even sure if he’s excited or nervous. Like, he’s really, really nervous. But he wants to see Adam again. But he shouldn’t want to see Adam again. And Adam’s ex-wife will be there. The mother of his child. Fuck that. Definitely nervous.

The parent-teacher conferences come up at the end of October, after the students have had some time to get used to the new school year, and the teachers have had some time to get to know the students and put together a sort of report on their learning progress and general behavior. Then the parents come in and they all have some good, quality sharing time. It’s precious, really. Ronan gets why the conferences are necessary, he gets that parents should be involved in their kids’ schooling, and they are often helpful to him, too. So it’s not that he doesn’t like them, he just… doesn’t like them. It goes back to his general lack of ability to socialize with professional adults. And his lack of stomach for socializing with professional adults. And his general disinterest in spending a whole evening with boring, mediocre parents. Really, the conferences are a good time for everyone. He still does them, he prides himself on being good at his job, he just isn’t always happy about it. This year is notably different. For no reason in particular.

Otherwise, it’s a pretty typical late October day, cloudy skies and crisp winds and all that, D.C. starting to catch up to the Northern East Coast in fall temperatures. Ronan has a few meetings with other parents first, gets through maybe four or five before it’s time to meet with Adam and his ex. The conferences last for a couple days, individual meetings with parents scheduled for either Wednesday or Thursday, preceded by a meeting with other school faculty members on Tuesday to introduce parents to their children’s first year of elementary school. Ronan didn’t go to that meeting, partly because it was optional for him, and mostly because he didn’t want to see the ex-Mrs. Parrish earlier than he had to. So when it finally comes time for their meeting, on the first day of the conferences, he’s reasonably distraught.

They come in together, and Ronan is a little wounded by that alone, because they actually look pretty good together. Adam, of course, looks good anyway, short dusty hair curling on his forehead, blue eyes bright under straight brows, his peculiarly angular face somehow even sharper under the classroom’s bright lighting. He’s standing tall in another drop-dead suit, this one an ashy gray over a crisp white shirt, devoid of a tie. He looks like a fucking model.

So does his ex.

She is not the woman Ronan saw bringing Nate to school the week prior, which doesn’t really make Ronan feel better about either situation. She's also short, but she's more of a lean, petite build. Her skin is lighter, she has freckles attractively scattered over her nose, and she has deep, sparkling brown eyes, which she apparently gave to Nate. Her long, pale brown hair is pulled back in a sleek ponytail, and her makeup is subtle, but artfully done. Objectively, Ronan knows she looks amazing. Personally, it doesn't warm her to him.

The couple stops at the chairs in front of his desk, each leaning slightly over to shake his hand in turn.

“Adam,” Adam says, shaking his hand, “We’ve met before.”

Ronan nods, shakes his hand cordially, pretends he isn't revelling in touching Adam again. Pretends he isn't mentally cataloging the squarish shape of Adam’s hands, the way the long, slender fingers wrap around Ronan’s own hand. Get your act together, Lynch. His ex is right there.

And then it’s gone and he pretends that it doesn’t bother him.

“Caitlin Carraway, Nate’s mom,” the woman says, taking his hand next. Her small, soft hands don’t have nearly the same impact on Ronan. It’s just a hand.

They sit in front of him, and each seems to have brought a goddamn list of questions. That’s not unusual, a lot of parents do that, but Ronan was just hoping maybe Adam wouldn’t constantly be the epitome of parenthood so that Ronan’s dumb heart could have a fucking break. Looks like he’s not going to have any luck there.

He starts talking about Nate, talking about his enthusiasm during some lessons and some of the friends he seems to be making in class. They ask him lots of questions about what subjects he’s struggling in and what subjects he’s doing well in, how well he participates, if he is ever late handing in homework, all kinds of crap. They take notes following Ronan’s answers. Nate is a kindergartener, so it’s not like Ronan has all that much to say to most of that - he is far too young to be skipping class or causing any real trouble, so most of Ronan’s answers tend to be short - he likes to read, he doesn’t seem to dislike doing schoolwork more than any of the other kids, he likes playtime, he’s five, etc., etc. Not a whole lot going on there. For what is probably the billionth time in his life, Ronan thanks God for the age he teaches. It’s actually a pretty productive meeting. Caitlin isn’t a monster, and it’s not even like Ronan was really expecting her to be, but he let himself work up quite an animosity that he almost regrets now. Would you fucking look at that.

“Has he had any more, um, incidents since I came in a couple weeks ago?” Adam asks, after the basics are covered, and Ronan almost snorts.

Has he had any more incidents? Well, not really. Has Ronan almost called Adam anyway? Absolutely. For almost a full week after the meeting, Ronan almost called Adam about every stupid thing that Nate did. One day he crawled onto his desk in the middle of a lesson, but Ronan decided that that wasn’t enough reason to call in a parent. Another day he hoarded every toy dinosaur during playtime, but Ronan wasn’t weak enough for Adam that he couldn’t admit that that’s pretty standard shit for a five year old, especially an only child. Then, just under a week ago, he threw a pack of crayons across the room for seemingly no reason. Ronan really almost called Adam that time, but he knew that Adam would be coming to the school a few days after the incident anyway, and he managed to control himself. No, there hadn’t actually been any significant incidents.

“Well, I mean, there haven’t been any as drastic as the one that warranted a phone call home. There have been a few misadventures involving throwing crayons and hoarding toys, but we worked it out. He has really calmed down since he started reading during class. Harry Potter, by the way? He has a really accelerated reading level, which is great.”

Adam beams. Ronan wants to die.

It’s a productive conference. It’s a long ass conference. Full of moments like this, when Adam is excited about his son’s educational career and he grins, wide and easy, pulling Ronan’s gaze toward his straight teeth, delicate jaw, and fucking dimples and he is a grown ass man, what grown ass man has dimples? What grown ass man looks so good with dimples like that? Ronan, fuck off, Caitlin is right goddamn there, stop staring.

When they finally leave, Ronan is so conflicted that he almost has a headache. He has a couple more meetings, though, so he shoulders through it. Then, he heads straight to Gansey’s.

“I need a drink.” This is how he introduces himself upon letting himself into the apartment.

Gansey just looks up from the stupidly huge book he is reading and annotating, probably for some part of his dissertation. He raises an eyebrow.

“There’s school tomorrow.”

“Yeah, and I’m driving home today. I didn’t say I’m going to become an alcoholic, I said I need a drink.” Very little turns a person off of excessive drinking as an adult like excessive drinking as a teenager. Drinking objectively far too much back in high school, and then being forced by Gansey to actually go to school the next day, really made Ronan grasp some concept of self control. That being said, he has just had a very long day, so he gets himself a beer.

He flops down next to Gansey on the couch when he has one, taking a long drink from it before sighing and throwing his arm over his face, trying to quell the still persistent headache.

“So, I’m guessing the meeting didn’t go very well?” Gansey sets aside the text he was working on.

“No, no, it went great. Lots of great parents today. And, hey, Caitlin, Nate’s mom? Super fucking nice.” He turns his head to look at Gansey, scathing for a lack of understanding of how otherwise to look at him in this situation. Gansey gets it and grimaces at him.

“And you saw Adam, too?”

“Yep. Still hot. Still nice and funny. Still hot.” He takes another gulp of beer and shakes his head, looking back at Gansey, this time a tad more pleading. “I’m so fucked, dude.”

Gansey hums his sympathy, picks up the mug of tea he has been drinking from, and clanks it against Ronan’s beer. “To your health. Physical and mental.”

Ronan snorts. “To you falling in a fucking ditch.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay guys, back again! Sorry about the delay, I was on vacation. Chapter 5 is still taking its time, but here have this!
> 
> as always, it's super nice and rewarding to see everyone's amazing response to the last chapter! it's always great to see people showing their interest, especially those who keep coming back every chapter. y'all are the very best xx

Adam walks into the small cafe, eyes searching for Blue. It’s almost funny, because he never had to look very hard for her when they were in high school. Back then, she seemed to make it a personal goal to dress as outrageously as possible, and was frequently found easily at any distance - Adam had outright laughed the first time he saw her in anything resembling professional attire. She still dresses like she used to, but it’s a weekday and she has work, so when Adam finds her she’s dressed in a pantsuit and sensible shoes, and it’s still kind of funny, despite all the time Adam has had to get used to it. They don’t normally meet for lunch on weekdays - their places of work aren’t that close to each other - but if they do they tend to prefer the small restaurant Adam is at now, about halfway between the law firm and the zoo. He sits down across from her in their semi-usual table by the window, slumping against its surface. She pouts sarcastically.

“Tough day? Wealth and prestige really weighing you down? Or,” she adds, pout turning into a smirk, “are you thinking about hot teacher man?”

Really, only Blue can tease him like this, jabbing at his job or his pathetic crush. Having been there for him during all the shit that made up his childhood gave her this ability, the one where she can poke without hurting. Similarly, they each grew up in relative poverty, and wealth is only just becoming something real and not something to mock others for having. They are currently in a strange in-between phase where they are probably becoming the people they used to make fun of, and there is no way that Blue will ever miss the opportunity to laugh at them about that. He at least wishes he could get a little pissed at her comment about “hot teacher man,” but he can’t, so he settles for flicking the straw in her cup of water while she’s drinking from it. She sputters and glares at him, but there’s no heat. He grins, straightening up in his seat.

“Shut up. How’s your day?” Despite years of his very best efforts, he can feel his words rounding out, vowels stretching and consonants sanding down, his accent crawling towards one of it’s own. He knows this happens a lot when he and Blue hang out, accents fueling each other with the familiarity and solidarity of two survivors of small-town Virginia. Nate is getting old enough to tell the difference, and sometimes he giggles when Adam’s accent comes out at home. It makes Adam smile, almost as much as he does when Nate says something in Adam’s accent without realizing.

“Ugh. New intern following the horticulturalists. He’s terrible. I don’t want to talk about it.”

Adam, truly having no idea what Blue does at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park, happily drops the subject - until, of course, she brings it back to the parent-teacher conference from last week.

“So, seriously Adam, what keeps happening with this guy that you can’t text me when I ask? As far as I’m concerned, there is no reason why I shouldn’t already know everything.”

“Ugh,” he says, unable to figure out how to describe it to her. Or unwilling to. “It’s just that like… it feels wrong to talk about it right next to Nate? In a recorded form, no less, a literal transcript that he will definitely find someday, knowing my luck.”

The first part is said as a question because it is, it’s Adam trying to figure out how to explain his hesitation in a way that isn’t entirely pathetic, and probably not quite succeeding. Based on Blue’s snort of laughter, he doesn’t even come close. This would be the cause of the “unwilling to” part of his hesitation. Blue, seeming to read his mind and appreciate the role she has been given there, jumps on the opportunity.

“Not sure you want Nate clicking away from Angry Birds to find that conversation? ‘Daddy, what does this mean? Why did you tell Aunt Blue that you want to climb Mr. Lynch?’”

Adam has both hands covering his face, but his shoulders are shaking, unable to completely contain his laughter.

“Oh my god, Blue.” When he pulls his hands away he looks scandalized, but he’s also grinning wide. “I can’t believe you just mentioned my five-year-old son in a sentence involving the phrase ‘climb Mr. Lynch.’ You’re so going to Hell.”

Blue crosses her arms over her chest, raises her eyebrows in a signature ‘fuck you’ expression that has sent many men running over the years, but she’s grinning too. A waiter appears to take Adam’s order, so he looks away from Blue and effectively halts the conversation. Blue, determined to make sure he’s aware of her independence, had ordered without him. He doesn’t mind, her ruthless individuality is almost an inside joke at this point, but it does mean that they need to stop this train of conversation before this nice man calls child protective services. He orders a sandwich and a coffee, desperately trying to prevent the afternoon slump that hits him without frequent re-caffeination, and turns back to Blue to find her staring at him expectantly.

“Okay,” she says, “Really. Be honest with me, there are those kinds of details from that night that you didn’t want to text, right?”

Adam sighs. “No, I mean, it was fine. Good, really, it was productive and I learned a lot about Nate’s education and attitude at school.”

The expectant look does not leave Blue’s face. “But…? I’m really sensing a ‘but’ here. There better be more, you’ve already told me all this.”

“But Ronan Lynch is unfairly attractive. And so I just sat there, next to Caitlin, and tried to focus on the education of our young child. It was kind of the worst.” Blue already knows this, too, so Adam goes on to mention the more pathetic details of his predicament. “And… I haven’t really been able to stop thinking about him all week.”

“Right, because sexy-disheveled-tattooed-open-shirted teacher is just too much to bear?” She’s laughing, entirely unapologetically, and Adam can’t even be mad. Again. Sometimes, Blue is a very frustrating friend to have.

“Actually, he looked perfectly put-together that day. It was almost worse. I know, I know, I’m a disaster. Doesn’t help that Nate keeps coming home from school talking about his really fun teacher.” He wants to say something to combat the snicker that is escaping Blue’s lips, anything to stop what he’s sure is going to be a comment on all the other ways he might be fun, but a buzz in his pocket distracts him. He pulls his phone out, a little surprised and concerned at the number on the screen, and taps the answer button.

“...Adam Parrish,” he answers, a little bit holding his breath.

“Hi, Adam. It’s Ronan Lynch.”

Yeah. Speak of the goddamn devil. Blue looks thoroughly confused at the look on his face, and he shoots her a careful look before answering, “Ronan Lynch. Hi.” Blue can’t completely muffle her snort, and Adam waves her away, only slightly panicky. “What can I do for you?”

Blue quirks her eyebrows, smirks, and he shoots her a look, half pissed and half pleading.

“Unfortunately, I’m going to have to ask you to come in again. Nate got a little carried away with a craft today, and threw his third tantrum this week. He was doing a lot better last week, but he seems to be in a mood this week, and obviously he can’t continue to behave this way. If you could meet with me at some point over the next couple of days to talk about potential solutions, that would be great.”

Adam is immediately in parent-mode, frowning out of the window, worried about Nate. He doesn’t even notice when the waiter brings their food until Blue quietly thanks him. “Of course. Any time that’s convenient for you.” Except, that’s not really true. A relatively important client is in town to rework contracts for his various business endeavors, and Adam will be swamped with meetings for the next couple of days. And then it’s Friday, which he feels a little bad about. “Though, unfortunately, I’m working late today and tomorrow, and I will only be able to come in on Friday. If that’s alright?”

“Available any time that’s convenient, as long as it’s Friday. Got it. Sounds good to me, will four work again?”

At least he’s taking it with humor. Adam tries not to sigh, because he actually has a meeting at three-thirty, which means there’s no way he’s making it to the school by four. “Is four-thirty okay? I have another meeting.”

“Sure man, that’s fine. I’ll see you then.”

Adam sighs after he hangs up. Blue is sucking at her straw, making an annoying vacuum sound at the bottom of her empty cup, looking at him with wide, interested eyes. She stops, smacks her lips, and looks at him nonchalantly. “Four-thirty, Adam? Might as well have invited him to dinner.”

“Yeah, we’ll have a great time getting the early, early, early-bird special. I work, Blue, what do you want.”

“Just saying, that’s kind of late. Maybe you should ask him to dinner for after the meeting, then,” she says, looking far too happy. Adam doesn’t want to mention that the meeting won’t take that long, for fear of crude comments about how he could make it last longer, which she will say only to watch his ears turn red, so he doesn’t. Instead, he rolls his eyes and starts shovelling his lunch. Of course, then he’s thinking of all the ways he could make it last longer, and he almost chokes. These next few days are going to be really long, he thinks.

 

* * *

 

He really, really tries not to be late this time. It almost works, but the client he spoke with seemed almost determined to take as long as feasibly possible to outline the specific needs of his relatively standard contract. As though Adam hadn’t gone to law school for nearly seven years. If it were almost any company meeting Adam would have been able to sneak out early, but since it was a meeting with a client, he had to sit and smile and listen to an elderly businessman insult his intelligence for almost an hour. It wasn’t yet rush hour, so he wasn’t too late to the school, but he sure as hell wasn’t on time. Again.

“Hi, I’m so sorry,” he said as he rushed into the room. “The meeting went a little long. I swear I’m not usually late. Actually, I’m not ever late, despite my record here. I’m really sorry, once again.”

Ronan looks completely unfazed, brushes off Adam’s attempts to apologize, and stands up to shake his hand. Today, Ronan’s sleeves are rolled up and his collar is open a few buttons, no tie in sight. Well, it’s in sight, Adam can just make it out where it’s balled up and stuffed behind a standing tear-off calendar. His professional mask slips a little, his eyebrows inching just the slightest bit upward as he looks back at Ronan, who doesn’t even look confused for a moment before smiling almost sheepishly. He looks over his shoulder at the thin strip of fabric peeking out from the current page on the calendar and looks back at Adam, releasing his hand and shrugging.

“Look man, if there’s anything harder than corralling kindergarteners, it’s doing it in a suit and tie.”

Adam can’t help but chuckle, and he raises his hands for a truce before taking a seat in a chair pulled close to Ronan’s desk. “Of course. I mean I get it, it’s annoying to wear all day at the office, and I don’t actually do anything.”

Ronan scoffs. “Sure, you don’t do anything until you have to come meet with me. Then you’re the busiest lawyer in D.C.”

At first, Adam just feels guilty, entirely unfazed by the rudeness of the comment and only worried about his performance as a father. Ronan’s eyes flicker to the where Adam can feel heat spreading on his ears, and seems to realize the unprofessional and tactless nature of the joke. He coughs and says, “Sorry, sorry, it was a joke. Not a good joke, noted. You’re fine, don’t worry about it. And hey, you came in late twice but then I made a sh-uh, stupid joke about it, so we’re even, right? Anyway, um, let’s get to Nate.”

The rest of the meeting passes relatively uneventfully, and it’s not a lot different from the first meeting Adam had with Ronan. Really, it’s not that surprising that Nate didn’t become a model student after one mild conversation about it. That actually would have been a lot to expect from a five-year-old, so neither Ronan nor Adam is actually worried about it.

“The thing is,” Ronan says after they establish the less-than-dire situation, “having you come in will be useful in teaching him that his actions have consequences. And anyone has bad days, but for some reason he has been acting up a lot this week, and obviously that’s not something we can roll with here.”

Adam doesn’t do much to hide his smile at Ronan’s casual wording. He just can’t help but feel comfortable here, which he suspects has nothing to do with the room’s very welcoming posters and the corner of plush toys, and everything to do with the relaxed teacher sitting near him. The meeting as a whole has been much more casual than any time the two have spoken before, and Adam finds himself more and more curious about the man before him. How he can be gentle around children, professional around parents, and somehow crude and relaxed in this intermediary setting, where Adam is a parent and they are at Ronan’s place of work but they are beginning to become familiar with one another. And still, Ronan has a knife blade appearance, and where does that fit in? How do any of these pieces of Ronan fit together?

“Of course,” Adam speaks firmly and reasonably, as though that tangential train of thought didn’t happen and never had before, either. He tries to find a way to word his next suggestion that doesn’t sound like a teenager with a crush. “Maybe, in the future, if Nate’s problems in class persist…you can just call me, and we can discuss the issue over the phone. It seems more convenient, and I probably won’t be late to a phone call.”

Did that sound like call me? Or did it sound like Adam didn’t want to see Ronan anymore? That isn’t true, not at all, but he really does work and he can’t keep leaving the office early to have the same conversation. At the same time, he can’t promise that Nate will immediately take to the education system now, and he doesn’t want to stop communicating with Ronan either way. He sincerely hopes that none of that was evident in his suggestion.

“Yeah, sure.” Ronan doesn’t seem at all bothered, which makes Adam feel better. “Actually, that sounds like a good idea. Sticking around here for an extra couple of hours isn’t the most fun, and I’m dead on my feet by the time I leave after these things.”

Adam nods - he knows a few things about being dead tired. “There has to to be coffee around here somewhere though. Don’t they support you teachers?”

Ronan looks momentarily nauseated. “The coffee here is practically a punishment. I still drink it, but it’s definitely not something anyone should consume twice a day. I’d almost rather fall asleep during a conference.”

Before he can stop it, a soft snort of a laugh bursts out of Adam. He blushes wildly and tries to avoid looking at Ronan, who is wearing a barely concealed expression of gleeful judgement. Adam clears his throat. “Glad to know this time together means so much to you.”

Is he flirting? Even he can’t tell. He thinks it’s very dangerous, if he is, and tries to remind himself that this is Nate’s teacher and getting involved is wildly inappropriate. He’s not sure when the idea went from impossible to just inappropriate, though, and that's interesting. Not that he has any time to consider that, though, because Ronan is not letting him off the hook for the disaster that just escaped his throat.

“No, wait, what sound was that? I didn’t even know humans could make that noise.”

Adam grimaces at him and Ronan grins back, cocky and frustratingly attractive. Unfortunately, he has to go get Nate from the daycare he spends the afternoon at, and he can’t ask Blue to get him unless there is any reason why he absolutely must stay here with Ronan, and there isn’t. He has a flash of his thoughts from lunch and tries to squash them before his blush entirely consumes him, because he has a feeling that Ronan would have a field day with that, and there’s no way he can explain to him the cause. So they exchange final pleasantries, and Adam leaves, feeling somehow lighter than he has in a long time.

 

* * *

 

Halloween is a relatively casual event, though Adam leaves the office during lunch the day of to go to Nate’s school to watch him in the short parade they put on. The elementary schoolers bring their costumes to school and walk around the playground in them to the background of cheesy Halloween songs for enamored parents with cheerful smiles and cell phone cameras. Nate is a very happy pirate, and he giggles and waves as he passes Adam, reaching out to poke him with a foam sword. Once the parade is over, the parents are invited to come inside to spend an hour with their kids at a small Halloween party. Really, Adam has to head back to work soon, but his next meeting isn’t until two, so he figures he can spare a moment for a paper cup of iced tea and a cheap sugar cookie. He’s sitting in a chair pulled up next to Nate’s desk, which has been pushed against the wall to make space for where other desks have been pushed together to form a table of snacks, where theoretically Nate is getting a cookie. He had jumped up a second ago and run off, claiming to want more snacks, but Adam can’t see him by the makeshift table anymore. Before Adam can get worried he sees Nate making his way back towards him, pulling one Ronan Lynch by the sleeve. It’s a long, loose sleeve that continues up into a long, loose shirt with a deep v-neck and a cheap, tattered vast.

“Look, Daddy, we match!” Nate says, grinning.

Adam laughs, “You sure do, kiddo. I think you make a better pirate, but don’t tell him.”

Nate giggles conspiratorially, and Ronan looks affronted. “Look, Nate has a sword, that’s cheating.”

“How is that cheating?” Adam scoffs, rolling his eyes in defense of his son. “He’s more prepared. You don’t even have an eyepatch. A hat and a shirt just isn’t a full costume, slacker.”

The banter comes naturally, and it only occurs to him to feel a little bad about it when Nate looks between the two of them and laughs again. Because right, Nate is here, because right, Nate. Not that Adam forgot about him, but he forgot for a moment that he doesn’t do this, he doesn’t banter with good-looking men because banter becomes flirting becomes dating becomes complicated and he’s a single father and he will be damned if he lets anything come before Nate. But then Ronan straightens his ridiculous pirate hat, all sarcastic self-importance as if to say yes it is, asshole, just watch and Adam can’t help but crack a smile, and he can’t help but grin wider at Nate’s delighted laugh. In a couple minutes he hugs Nate and leaves for the office, and the smile is still there.

The next month passes in much the same way. Things are brighter somehow; work isn’t as tedious, days pass easier. Thanksgiving is loud and cheerful at Blue’s house, her mother and various aunts and cousins making the trek from their small squished home down South to Blue’s small squished apartment in the city. They used to go down, but this way Adam doesn’t have to drive so much between going to Blue’s Thanksgiving and bringing Nate to Caitlin’s. Instead, he and Nate get to take part in the time honored tradition of getting caught under the feet of countless women, something Adam has proudly been doing since high school, and Nate gets to play with the seemingly revolving cast of young nieces and nephews and the children of family friends. Adam doesn’t even worry much about Nate’s two day Thanksgiving celebration or the fact that he’s to blame for it - and he has long since stopped stressing about not seeing his own family around the holidays. It isn’t that Adam wasn’t happy before, because he definitely was, but somehow there’s more room in his lungs than there used to be. Blue laughs at him, but he sees no reason for it, it’s not like it’s because of Ronan. He doesn’t even see Ronan much anymore, really, it’s got nothing to do with him. Things are just feeling more settled than they have in a long time.

Okay, so Ronan calls him usually once every week or two, leaves him messages or manages to catch him between meetings and updates him on Nate’s behavior at school, but still. And Adam swears he means to get around to talking to Nate about it, he just doesn’t get the chance to every time, that’s all. Normally they’re small offenses anyway, just Ronan letting Adam know about a particularly excessive amount of outbursts during storytime, or more toy throwing.

Once, Blue attempts to call him out on it. She’s at his apartment and it’s a Saturday night, Nate is in Baltimore with Caitlin, so Adam and Blue are sitting on the floor in the living room, watching trashy reality TV that they both hate. Blue is making her way through a bottle of wine, so she looks up at him after a trophy wife onscreen makes a particularly scandalous comment and says, “Funny how you never tell Nate after Ronan calls you to mention bad behavior.”

She lifts her eyebrow, but it’s less a question than it is a gotcha.

“Who says I never tell him? Why do you assume that?” Adam asks, defensive.

“Do you tell him?” She counters. He looks away, blush rising slowly up his neck, and she points her wine glass at him as though that means she has won.

“It’s just, I don’t know, it doesn’t seem like things that are that important! Not enough that I should tell him every time, anyway.”

“And, if you tell him to get it together in school then Ronan will stop calling you.” She smirks.

Adam is already shaking his head, though. “No! No, you know I want him to do well in school. I just…”

“You just also want Ronan to call you.”

He looks at her, pleading. “Am I a terrible father?”

“Adam. Please. You’re, like, the single greatest father ever. The greatest single father ever. You’re allowed to want things, Adam. Wanting things doesn’t make you a terrible father.” She bumps her shoulder against his and he smiles, then looks at the time and stands.

“It’s late, we should sleep. You’re not driving tonight.”

She nods and stands easily, then collapses on the couch behind him. “Get me a blanket. I’m your guest.”

He rolls his eyes, but he corks the wine and puts the glass in the sink, and throws a blanket over her on his way back through the living room. “Sleep well, asshole.”

He resolves to talk to Nate about the calls, and he does, on Monday while he cooks dinner, but even he admits that it’s a weak attempt. He’s honestly not even sure if Nate is listening, but he feels better about having tried. But of course, he gets another call a few days later from Ronan apologizing for the inconvenience but suggesting, not incorrectly, that one call home a week for a month is too many times to not warrant another face-to-face meeting. Nate had been acting up again, so clearly just calling wasn’t going to be enough.

When Adam walks into Ronan’s classroom for their third private meeting, he isn’t late. He is, however, holding two take-out cups of coffee.

Ronan stands to greet him, but raises an eyebrow when Adam holds out one of the cups instead of just his hand to shake. Adam raises both of his in challenge, and says with a small, easy smile, “You complained about being tired the last time I kept you late on a Friday. And apparently the coffee here is radioactive, or something like that.”

Ronan huffs, but takes the coffee. “I did not complain. And I didn’t say it was radioactive, either, stop putting words in my mouth.”

Adam does not think about other things he could put in Ronan’s mouth.

“I’m a lawyer, it’s what I do,” He says, and Ronan snorts but he sips his coffee. “I just got it black, I hope that’s alright, you don’t seem like the kind of guy who drinks seven dollar, flavored espresso foam drinks.”

Ronan smirks. “Yeah, no, it’s great. But come on, those drinks taste amazing. You drink them, be honest.”

Adam laughs, surprised, but he shakes his head. Ronan scoffs.

“You’re missing out.” They start talking about Nate, and Adam admits that he hasn’t been as diligent as he should have been passing along Ronan’s scolds, and Ronan shakes his head. “You just make things harder for me, then. And, by the way, Nate called me ‘slacker’ for a week after Halloween, so thanks for that.”

There’s little heat in his words, though, and Adam finds himself laughing entirely unapologetically. The conversation, while still focused on Nate’s success as a student, takes many detours like this. Somehow, two cardboard cups with Adam’s name on them smooth over the boundary of strict professionalism. Not that it has been standing up well lately anyway.

They’re almost done, Adam stands to leave, but suddenly Ronan looks up at him, open and curious and a little…more. Adam can’t quite place the extra thoughts weighing down Ronan’s gaze, so he waits for him to speak.

“Adam, I’m going to say something. Or ask something, whatever. Did you…does it…” He rolls his eyes, seemingly frustrated at his own incoherence. He stands, moves closer to Adam and says, “It seems like you brought a coffee date to my classroom.”

Adam can feel the flush spreading across his face, feels the heat start in his cheeks and cross his nose and flare in his ears. Shit. It was too far, bringing coffee, way too far, and now Ronan thinks he’s hitting on him. Except, is he hitting on him? Has he been hitting on him? Adam wishes he could tell. He’s scrambling to scrape together an excuse, and apology, but Ronan speaks again, looking almost as embarrassed as Adam feels.

“I’m sorry, that was stupid, I shouldn’t have assumed. You should go. I’m really sorry about this.” He’s almost stuttering, his eyes are skipping around the room, refusing to meet Adam’s but his posture is almost unchanged, trying to maintain some normalcy so Adam isn’t embarrassed.

It would almost be endearing, but Adam is too hung up on Ronan’s words to notice. Stupid? Shouldn’t have assumed? Could be wishful thinking, but…to Adam, it sounds like Ronan wanted the answer to be yes.

“Ronan, stop.” He takes a step closer, which he’s not sure is appropriate in this situation, but he needs to reassure Ronan somehow. “Stop. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make it seem that way. I wasn’t trying to make any assumptions either. But, if that’s how you took it…I wouldn’t say no. To it being a coffee date. Or to a real one next time.”

Ronan stills, and a small smile starts forming at the corners of his lips, softer than Adam has seen on his thus far. “Yeah? We can probably make that happen.”

Adam nods, swallows, and says, “Yeah. Um. Call me.” And then flees.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok you guys here we go, I'm trying to get into that habit of posting once a week, we'll see how this goes. I'm going to be honest this chapter was crazy difficult for me to write for some reason, so it's a little shorter than usual. I also haven't started chapter 6 yet, so again I can't make promises about posting next week, but I will try!!
> 
> also to warn y'all, since I forgot to do so before leaving for vacation, I'm helping my sister move this weekend, so forgive me if this chapter takes a minute longer!
> 
> and like not to hype it up to much but I am very excited about the next chapter :)))
> 
> thanks as always for your patience and constant support, I hope you like this!! xx

Ronan is completely still for what feels like several minutes after Adam leaves. They’d been getting so casual lately, so comfortable in what were supposed to be professional conferences about the wellbeing of a child, and Ronan hadn’t even noticed. And now a date? Maybe? Man, he’s in so far over his head. He wants to be mad at himself for even mentioning the date, what had fucking possessed him to do that? The moment of panic, of embarrassment, of oh god I fucked up, he’s straight he’s my student’s dad I Fucked Up, when Adam hesitated might have been the death of him. And what if it had stopped there? If Adam had grabbed his shit and left, disgusted. Jesus, what a mess.

But then he looks up, the coffee cups still placed on his desk, a barista’s hurried scrawl on the side. Adam. Ronan huffs a laugh, teeth showing because he can’t reasonably stop himself from being happy about this anymore. It’s stupid and he never should have mentioned it because Christ, what a fucking what if but that’s not actually how it played out. Adam maybe sort of asked him out. Or invited Ronan to ask him out? Whatever, something happened and there’s possibility there now. He really needs to get a handle on the stupid smile spreading across his face.

There's a stack of worksheets in front of him that need to be looked at and a lesson plan only half finished but he picks up the coffee cups, takes a final gulp of his, and tosses them in the trash on his way out of his classroom.

School ended hours ago, so it's pretty up in the air about who's still in the building. By this time most teachers are heading home, but plenty are sticking around to get the most out of the air of productivity here before bailing to go fuck around with friends or be with family. Ronan wanders the halls, tries to keep his back straight in case he runs into anyone important, and makes his way towards the intermediate school wing.

“Ronan!” Noah yells happily over his music as soon as Ronan pokes his head through his door.

Ronan's shoulders drop immediately into his trademark slouch, mouth turning up as he surveys the colorful disaster that is Noah’s classroom.

“What the fuck are you doing Czerny?”

Noah surveys the chaos. “Testing a lesson plan. Duh. Hey, you think the headmaster will let me teach glitter splatter painting?”

Bottles of multicolored paint are open all over the room, half of everything is tarped but just enough is left exposed that some students might have to stand tomorrow if the paint on their chairs isn't dry by then. Some of the paint comes flecked with glitter, but just in case that isn't enough Noah seems to have dumped out several full bottles of technicolor glitter onto a tray. Ronan's not quite sure how he's been getting it from there onto the paint splattered paper all over the room, but given the state of Noah's hands he's willing to bet he has just been fucking throwing it. He raises a sharp brow.

“Uh. Sure she will man. Look at this wealth of academic opportunity. You could very well be teaching the next Michelangelo.”

Noah beams, and then whips a purple-dripping paintbrush towards a clean sheet of paper.

Ronan pulls out his phone, sends a quick text. in noahs grand studio. you should come see what the master is working on. He knows Gansey is still here, Gansey is always still here. Then he reaches over, grabs the hat off Noah’s head, and grabs a paintbrush.

When Gansey shows up almost half an hour later, Ronan and Noah are laying on the floor, mostly covered in paint, arguing about the music that’s still blaring through the room.

“Top 40 isn’t music dude, this song literally has one verse repeated over and -- oh, hey Gansey. Tell Noah this song sucks.” Ronan sits up, pulls Noah’s hat backwards from where it had been resting over his eyes.

Gansey listens for a second before stating, “I like this song.” Friendship over.

Noah sits up to high five him, opens his mouth to sing but Ronan cuts him off with a snort. “Of course you do. Man, what’s wrong with you two? When did Coldplay become cool again? What fucking year is it?”

Gansey drops to the floor next to them, surveying the completed artwork. “I could ask you the same question. What are you still doing here? Don't tell me you have been here splattering glitter for hours.”

Noah takes a moment to look offended on behalf of his work.

“Why is it so weird that I would be here?” Ronan asks. “I work too you know.”

He pointedly ignores Gansey’s unimpressed look. Instead, he hauls himself to his feet and helps Noah attempt to return his room to something resembling a presentable state. He can feel Gansey staring at him, eyes burning holes through his paint splattered shirt right to his ink splattered skin, but the man in question just scoffs, brushes Ronan off.

“Interesting, I wasn’t aware. I so rarely see you here,” he remarks. What an asshole.

Ronan tells him as much, simultaneously watching himself give in to Gansey’s unspoken greater interest. He’s going to tell him eventually, Ronan knows, might as well get on with it. “You’re a dick. I had a conference with a parent.”

Understanding lights in Gansey’s eyes. Ronan hates when that happens. “Oh? And which lucky parent got to spend their evening with you?”

Ronan sighs. He rolls his eyes. Gansey is so much. He begrudgingly makes with the getting on with it. “Yes, Gansey.”

“I didn’t ask you a yes or no question,” Gansey says, but Ronan can hear the smile in his voice, that bastard.

Before Ronan can respond Noah is gasping dramatically, spinning around from where he is standing in the corner trying to coerce his school-standard print drying rack to hold far more than it can reasonably be asked to. “You saw Hot Dad again!”

Neither Ronan nor Gansey can be blamed for the synchronized eyebrow raise they give him. “Jesus Czerny. Take a couple fewer adderall tomorrow okay?”

“Well that’s rude,” Noah snickers, “You know I only take my prescribed dosage. You’re deflecting. What happened?”

Gansey looks far too pleased about having an ally in his war against Ronan keeping his private life private. Like somehow Ronan has to spill because Gansey wasn’t the one who asked what happened for once. In reality Ronan sort of wants to hit them both, just a little, but he settles for flipping them off before returning to funneling leftover glitter into a bottle that it definitely come from originally.

Noah looks at Gansey, excited. “Something happened, he’s never this deflect-y.” Gansey typically doesn’t push Ronan much, having figured out Ronan’s protective bullshit tolerance at this point, but Noah takes a completely different approach. He prefers the “poke a sleeping bear” method, and he’s damn lucky that there’s something whimsical and harmless about him that Ronan values, otherwise he might be dead by now.

“Can you chill out?” Ronan attempts to diffuse the anticipation in the air, but they all know a lost cause when they see one.

“Can you?” Noah counters. Whimsical and harmless, Ronan reminds himself.

“He asked me out, sort of.”

There’s a loud whoop and Noah is jumping, ever the child, and Gansey cracks a smile but asks, “‘Sort of’?”

Ronan shrugs and leans back against the nearest table, probably getting glitter all over his slacks. “I mean like. He didn’t ask me out exactly, there’s no time or place or whatever but he said he would want to? So I don’t know.” He rubs a hand over his face, hating what he’s about to say. “Like, am I supposed to call him? Am I waiting on a call? Does he even have my number or is he going to have to, like, call the school for it. That’s embarrassing.”

“So is this,” Noah says. Ronan picks up the nearest object, a brown squarish gum eraser, and throws it at him.

 

* * *

 

There’s a message waiting on his phone when he gets home. Actually, there are several, multiple from Gansey and Noah each. Gansey’s are all continuations of the conversation they had in Noah’s classroom before they all admitted that they didn’t know what to do and went home. Really, he’s just repeating half of it over again but with a degree of pride and support he had reigned in when Noah had been there. They like Noah a lot, have become very good friends since meeting him when they started at the school, but there is some kind of unspoken agreement that Gansey will not involve needless levels of emotional analysis during conversations with others or in public spaces. Ronan appreciates this about him. Noah’s messages all say “get it r,” and there are 26 of them.

The message worth noting is from Declan Lynch. Ronan swallows and opens it. It’s not that he doesn’t like his brother, because he does, but their relationship is somewhat tentative. They try, but it’s not all that easy to come back as one happy family after ten years of flaming hell between the two of them, fallout from losing both their parents in one damn go, so. There’s some hesitation compared to normal brothers.

From: Brother 2 [6:07 PM]  
Hey, call me when you get a chance. -D

So there’s this, now. Which is okay, Ronan supposes. They do this thing, overly cautious, where they try to avoid interrupting each other’s lives without warning. It’s so like Gansey’s courtesy about Ronan’s emotional boundaries, and yet so frustratingly unlike it. Because Gansey learned that by watching Ronan go off like a fucking grenade for most of his teenage years, while Declan learned this by frequently being the one to pull the pin. Ronan has a headache.

He sets out food for Chainsaw and then swallows some aspirin before he picks up his phone and starts the call. She shows up in a mostly ungraceful tumble of feathers and starts tearing through his kitchen, the familiar cacophony calming him some.

“Hey Ronan.” Declan picks up on the second ring. Has he just been waiting around for Ronan to get back? “You’re home late. Busy day?”

Ronan tries to tell himself that this isn’t menial pleasantries, reminds himself that he and his brother are friendly now, most of the time. “Something like that. You need somethin’?”

“Matthew and I were just talking about Christmas, that’s all.”

“Oh. Okay. Matty’s place this year, right?” God he hopes so. They usually rotate the location of their small celebration, if only because none of the Lynches like hosting at all and this was the only way they could figure that was somewhat fair, or at least equally unfair to all of them. He doesn’t much feel like going all the way to New York City to spend the holiday is his younger brother’s comparatively cramped apartment, but he would rather do that than have to act like an adult and entertain them here.

Declan sounds perfectly neutral in his response. “Actually, I thought I’d host again this year.”

What? That doesn’t make any sense. Declan held Christmas last year, and he isn’t any more inclined to cater to other people than the rest of the brothers are, regardless of how he acts during election season. Ronan opens his mouth to say so, but Declan starts talking again.

“The Ganseys are having a get together, you see, and it would make more sense to already be in town, rather than rushing back and forth between D.C. and New York.”

There it is. “By ‘get together’ you mean giant gala at which you can kiss the asses of the best known politicians within a hundred miles, right?”

There’s silence on the line for a second, and then, “Well…”

Ronan snorts. “Gansey didn’t mention a holiday party.”

“I received an invitation from his mother a couple of days ago. He did ask me to wait until he let you know, but who knows when he would have gotten around to it. I’d rather RSVP sooner than later, that’s just impolite.” Declan is all business, voice encouraging Ronan to consider him pragmatic rather than pushy. Ronan just sighs.

“I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow and get back to you.” He knows that Gansey is going to be nine types of accommodating, but he’s also going to want Ronan to go. Matty is also going be game, since it means he gets to skip hosting this year, and Ronan has never been great at denying his little brother. Between his exuberance and Gansey’s calm understanding Ronan knows he’s going to cave, but he likes to put up some front of independence.

“I’ll talk to you later then, I suppose.” He’s a little frustrated, Ronan can tell, but Declan doesn’t push it and that’s a good enough development for them that Ronan hangs up feeling a little less shitty about spending some of his vacation time rubbing elbows with D.C.’s richest liars.

 

* * *

 

He gets to school early on Monday morning so he can finish the grading he had been sluggish to deal with all weekend. If anyone asks, he needed the mental health days following the reveal that he would indeed be attending a political event a few days before Christmas. Gansey had been unerringly polite about Ronan’s obvious lack of interest, of course, but even he knew that Ronan wasn’t about to say no to Matthew. Ronan hadn’t even spoken to Matty about it yet, but his little brother never gives a shit about where they go or what they do as long as it means he doesn’t have to clean his apartment, so it was kind of easy to figure his preference.

Ronan’s just finishing up as he hears little feet moving in the hallway, and he straightens his shit up as his students start filing in.

Or, rather, one student does. Little Nate Parrish is the first and only kid through the door, and Ronan looks at the clock on the wall and realizes that it’s early yet for buses to be here, and the before care program is just about to end. He glances out the window and thinks he can just make out the tail of a shiny dark car pulling into the street. A smile threatens his lips as he glances back to his student, standing in front of his desk and looking dwarfed by the backpack on his back and the huge Starbucks cup in his hands.

“Hey little man, you’re here early. Did you miss the bus?” But the kid is already shaking his curly head.

“No. My daddy dropped me off. He wants me to give you this.” And he thrusts out the cup of what Ronan had assumed was hot chocolate or something. Guess not?

“Oh, well, thanks buddy.” He takes it slowly, the smile that was peeking out earlier coming out full force. The cup has one of those sticker receipts from the drive-through on it that proclaim it to contain a venti white chocolate mocha latte with an extra shot of espresso. Ronan takes a cautious sip. Fuck it’s so good. There’s slanted handwriting above the cardboard sleeve.

One of those $7 flavored espresso foam drinks. I hope it’s better than the school stuff. -Adam

Nate is looking at him matter-of-factly. “He said I couldn’t get a cake pop because it’s too early and I had Cap’n Crunch for breakfast, but I can have one later for bringing this to you. He says you work hard, but he also said you’re a slacker so I don’t know.”

Ronan laughs, loud and unchecked. “Your dad is a very smart man. How about you keep an eye out during class and then at the end of the year you tell me if you think I’m a hard worker okay?”

There’s a pause, and then Nate is nodding like this sounds like a fair deal to him. Ronan grins, so Nate smiles and giggles and accepts Ronan’s high five. It’s kind of adorable as hell.

“Sounds good bud. Wanna head to your seat and start getting your stuff ready for class? You have to make sure I’m doing my job well, right?” He might be suggesting way too much power to this five year old, and either way Ronan is definitely digging his own grave here, but he can’t help it. He’s still smiling, and his heart is beating kind of funny, now that he thinks about it.

Nate nods and smiles again and moves to his desk as other students start filing in. Ronan greets them all individually, takes another sip of his coffee, and tries to get a goddamn grip. It goes about as well as he thought it would.


End file.
